The Problem with Pop Rocks
by Fuzzy Necromancer
Summary: Terra puts an urban legend about pop rocks and soda to the test. Contains improbable inflation, and language offensive to tamaranian hatchlings, but not to english-speakers.


Terra loved sugar.

Terra's formative years were spent wandering the hinterlands, eating boiled scorpions, lizard-bits, and cactus water. She tried pretending that the scorpions were mini lobsters, but it didn't help much.

Terra once heard heard that one of Jesus's sidekicks had wandered the dessert living on nothing but grasshoppers and honey. Apparently people were impressed by this. Terra scoffed at it. She would have loved to catch food that couldn't sting or bite. Grasshoppers where comfort food compared to the variety of biting, stinging, and clawing things she had to subdue with a rock every mealtime. She'd tried to get honey from wild bees, but all she'd gotten was a lot of stings and a mouthful of wax-covered tree bark. As far as Terra was concerned, that wandering holy guy was a gourmet.

Because lizards, scorpions, and cactus-water weren't the least bit sweet, Terra could fully appreciate the novelty of the taste sensation. She was denied it the first half of her life, and she determined to make up for that loss even if it made her sick. She scarfed down entire bags of fun-size candy bars by the hour. She left restaurants with her pockets bulging with sugar packets. She drank honey straight from the squeeze-bear.

Terra worked through her binges in reverse alphabetical order. She started with Zagnuts, and finished up with the almond joys.

She tossed aside the empty two-liter bottle of Pop, Soda and picked up an economy size bag of pop rocks. She tore open the brightly colored packaging and raised it to her expectant lips.

"Hey Terra, I-No! Don't eat that!" Beast Boy screamed. Turned into a kangaroo and hopped forward, trying to knock the back out of her hand.

Terra's hand acted faster than her brain. She had already tipped the candy into her mouth and swallowed.

"What's wrong?" Terra asked, after she shifted the lump of unchewed sweets down her throat.

"Dude! You just drank a soda and ate pop rocks!" Beast Boy tugged at his hair, eyes bulging with terror and exasperation.

"So?" Terra said, a little quaver in her voice. A sense of unease crept up her spine.

"If you drink soda and eat pop rocks, you'll explode!" Beast Boy squealed. He turned into a puffer fish, swelled up, then turned back and clapped his hands together to demonstrate.

"Pop rocks and soda make you explode?" Raven repeated skeptically.

"They totally do!" Beast Boy said. "Cyborg's cousin's online friend's coworker's boyfriend's accountant saw it happen once!"

Raven rolled her eyes and put her kettle on to boil.

"Come to think of it, *hic*, I am feeling a bit *hic* funny," Terra said nervously. Her belly was already sticking out from all the processed sugar and soda she had forced into it. If she listened closely, she could hear an odd gurgling noise.

"Terra is not going to explode. I haven't earned enough good karma for that to happen," Raven said.

Beast Boy was still staring at Terra. He edged back a little, and ducked behind a couch.

"I'm not going to explode, am I?" Terra wondered aloud. Her tummy did feel a little tighter. Her shirt was riding up. Wasn't it below her belly button a few seconds ago? The gurgling got louder, and she felt a slight pain starting in her gut.

Beast Boy poked his head out from behind the couch.

"Terra, are you okay?"

"I don't know. I, I feel funny," she said. She headed towards the bathroom. Maybe she could find some tums.

She tripped. There was something wrong with her feet. She couldn't balance properly. She got up and tripped again.

Now her belly was groaning. It wasn't the familiar I'm-hungry-enough-to-eat-an-East-European-village groan, or the low rumble of frantic digestion. It was a drawn-out, rubbery sort of grown.

There was no question now. Her oversized T-shirt was pushed up just under her bra. Her pants button flew off and ricocheted around the room, and her jeans unzipped as a swelling belly forced them out. She tried to put her hands on her hips. She couldn't reach them. There was too much swollen, smooth belly in the way.

"What the gremplork?" Terra asked aloud. When she tried to stand up, she launched into the air, and drifted a few feet before landing.

"It's probably just a stomach-ache," Raven said, her eyes focused on a cup of cooling tea.

Beast Boy turned around to look at her and froze, eyes tiny dot in a face gone blank with horror.

The pain was getting worse, and now she could barely stay on the ground. The slightest movement set her drifting. She heard a ripping noise and panicked. Was she starting to break up already? Terra felt all over the swollen orb at her middle, but the tight, shiny skin was intact. She reached around and felt loose threads on her T-shirt.

_Oookay Terra, don't panic, you're not coming apart. _

_Yet._

"Um, help?" Terra squeaked out. Her tummy was as wide as she was tall. Her arms and legs seemed to be spaced differently, and she could feel her hips and shoulders widen with the swelling mass. It didn't hurt though. The pain was gone, and she only felt growth as she lifted into the air.

"Get some antacid! Keep her away from any pins! Oh frell oh Terra oh no!" Beast Boy jabbered, running around in a circle.

Raven turned around and swallowed the sarcastic quip. She raised both eyebrows, dumfounded, at the sight of Terra the human balloon.

She was still expanding, and not just in her belly. Chest and backside had swelled up, giving her shirt and pants considerable strain. She was surprised they hadn't burst apart at the seams. If she made it threw this, she vowed to right a five-star review for the brand on .

Her legs and arms got wider and shorter. She could feel her neck disappearing into the central sphere. She must be more than seven feet in diameter by now.

_You know, if I wasn't about to die, this would be cool. I could just float around, maybe get some snacks up here in the rafters and a ceiling-mounted- _

"Ow!" Her train of thought was interrupted as her head banged against a light fixture.

"Gremplork! That's the third time this week I've had my fantasies interrupted by a halogen bulb! I am so switching to fluorescents!"

Terra tried to rub her head, but she couldn't. She had become a huge ball with hands, feet, and a head sticking out. Her shadow was a huge circle of darkness on the floor. She must be three times wider than Beast Boy was tall, at the least.

Then she heard the stretching. It was a steady whine with some vibrato, rising in pitch. She didn't feel any pain, but she could feel pressure, pounding inside her, waiting to be let out.

"I don't wanna die!" she squeaked.

Her face covered in sweat. The gas building inside her had to be released.

There was an outrush of air. The windows shattered. The cutlery rattled.

Terra had let out the loudest burp in human history.

She was deflated in an instant, and had come whizzing down to earth. Fortunately, something had cushioned her fall.

"Yay! Terra didn't die!" Beast Boy said.

"Oh man, that feels sooo much better," Terra said, smacking her tummy. She looked down and then stepped off of Beast Boy's face.

Raven gaped at them, flustered, blinking rapidly.

"I told you she wouldn't explode," Raven muttered.


End file.
